AI and Technological Change (1)

Jennette Arnold: Please provide a list of initiatives your Chief Digital Officer, Theo Blackwell, has been involved with since his appointment?

The Mayor: The progress of work of the Chief Digital Officer for London is set out openly through the Smarter London Together Report Card https://trello.com/b/CIoKi2mP/smarter-london-together-report-card
This is a three year workplan of over 20 projects covering user-led design; data-sharing and data ethics; digital connectivity; digital skills and fostering greater collaboration with the tech ecosystem across London’s public services.

Mayor’s office

Andrew Boff: What is the total Mayor’s office budget for the 2019/20 year?

The Mayor: The total Mayor’s office budget for the 2019/20 year is £5.974 million.

AI and Technological Change (3)

Jennette Arnold: When were you last briefed by the Smart London Board? Do you agree with me that the GLA should be at the forefront in engaging Londoners about data use?

The Mayor: The development of the Smarter London Together Roadmap in 2018 was shaped by the views of Londoners who told us that in our approach to data and emerging tech we need to put people first and respect diversity when we design digital services or adopt new approaches.
The Chief Digital Officer for London conducted over 80 meetings and the largest public engagement of Londoners on ‘smart city’ issues through our innovative ‘Your Commute’ online tool.
64,879 Londoners used the tool during the Smart London listening period, with 88,050 total users. At the time of writing it’s the second most visited page on London.gov.uk in 2018; and it generated 7,426 Talk London email sign-ups and several hundred survey responses.
More than 1,700 Londoners took our Smart London survey and over 200 shared views in the manydiscussion threads.
In addition, the GLA and GLA group has conducted or is involved with several other engagements with Londoners to assess their views and appetite for data-sharing and sensors:
The Mayor is regularly updated on the work of the Smart London Board through a report from the Chief Digital Officer for London following every meeting of the Board. The proceedings are also published on the Smarter London Together Report Card. All progress on our Roadmap is updated and openly on this platform.

AI and Technological Change (2)

Jennette Arnold: Please outline your expectations from the AI City-to-city collaboration that you joined in March 2019.

The Mayor: The ‘City to City Digital Declaration’ – signed by London’s Theo Blackwell and Helsinki’s Mikko Rusama – sets out several new areas of collaboration between the two capitals, including:
GLA officials have met their counterparts to discussion city data and the use of 3D modelling, which Helsinki has good experience of. This has shaped our thinking about the functionality of future models we might consider in our ‘call for interested parties’ earlier this year.
Since February Helsinki and London have collaborated on thinking around AI in city services at a workshop with city officials in Helsinki and a meeting with Amsterdam city government in July. We share the view that cities need to develop new expertise and frameworks to guide decision-making or to update existing rules and ways of working to ensure public accountability when technologies are adopted. The result has been to inform the GLA’s approach on AI ethics in city services towards proposing a framework for public officials to make decisions about AI deployment more transparently.
Finally, we are exploring how Helsinki can input into the future design of the Mayor’s Civic Innovation Challenge, an open call approach to the tech sector to solve urban problems.